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Discseel® For Golfers
By: Our Medical Team | September 25, 2024
Aussie pro golfer Bruce Crampton called golf “a compromise between what your ego wants you to do, what experience tells you to do, and what your nerves let you do.” He may well have added “and what your back will say ‘yes’ to.” Few sports test one’s spinal function and fluidity more than golf. Advice abounds on how to angle your spine for reliably long, powerful shots off the tee. But it’s even more important to protect your spine from injury throughout a lifetime on the links. That means building stretching and strengthening exercises into your weekly routine. It also means being proactive about attending to back pain before it moves from an intermittent annoyance to a debilitating life-changer.
Back and neck pain are the most common symptoms of degenerative disk disease, an ailment that afflicts more than 90% of people aged 60 and above. Even younger players on the course aren’t immune—by age 35, about 30% of people will show evidence of disc degeneration.1 It’s part of the normal wear and tear of aging, and it may never cause discomfort. But many people lose flexibility as these spinal shock absorbers wear down or dry out. The discs can also bulge outward, herniate or leak, which can impinge upon or inflame nearby nerves—the lumbar pain that keeps you in the cart instead of on the green.
People often downplay initial experiences with back pain as tweaks, twinges or stiff muscles that will go away of their own accord with a little rest and attention to not further exacerbating the problem. While the symptoms of degenerative disc disease may, in fact, wane, that does not mean that the mechanics underlying them have disappeared. It’s best to address the problem early. CT scans, MRIs and X-rays can pinpoint the source of discomfort, providing detailed images of soft tissue and bone. From there, provided that the disc degeneration is not severe, your physiatrist can create a non-surgical treatment plan that keeps pain at bay and allows you to continue to enjoy your days on the course.
Non-surgical measures are the preferred way to treat degenerative disc disease. There are a range of treatments in your physiatrist’s toolbox, including the innovative Discseel® Procedure. This minimally invasive technique uses a Fibrin biologic to seal the disc, thus instantly stopping the disc from leaking and inflaming the nerves, and instigates healthy, new tissue growth that repairs the disc for the long haul. It can be used to treat annular tears in the disc, bulging or herniated discs, and sciatica, eliminating chronic low back pain.
Your physiatrist may also consider treating your degenerative disc pain with:
- Epidural steroid injections
- Activity modification and physical therapy
- Platelet-rich plasma therapy
- Pulsed radiofrequency
- Radiofrequency thermocoagulation
- Nerve blocks
In the most severe cases — those that don’t respond to non-surgical treatments or whose disc degeneration has caused spinal cord compression, for instance — a surgeon may remove the offending disc and, if need be, stabilize the vertebrae with spinal fusion surgery. But surgery should never be the first resort when it comes to degenerative disc disease associated with aging. Yes, it can relieve the pain, but it will also immobilize a segment of the spine — that’s what fusion does — or, in the case of a discectomy, weaken the disc, thus leaving it even more susceptible to further damage with every arced swing and bend at the waist. The Discseel Procedure, on the other hand, is proven to strengthen the disc and return you to full mobility.
The laws of physics dictate that the twisting that comes with a great golf swing—or even a mediocre one—causes a great amount of stress on lumbar discs. When back and neck pain start to affect your ability to enjoy a day on the course, talk to us about The Discseel Procedure and other non-surgical ways to get you back to the sport you love.
1. Columbia University Irving Medical Center, Neurosurgery, Degenerative Disc Disease, accessed 26 August 2024
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